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August, 7, 2017


DESCRIPTION OF DATASET

This folder contains the replication files for the paper �Channelling Hearts and Minds: Advocacy Organizations, Cognitive-Emotional Currents, and Public Conversation� by Christopher A. Bail, Taylor Brown, and Marcus Mann, which appears in the American Sociological Review, 2017. 

These data describe the social media outreach of 82 autism and organ donation advocacy organizations on Facebook between 2011-2012 collected via a social media application that collected public and non-public data from the Facebook Application Programming Interface and surveyed representatives of the organization in order to obtain additional information on the size, resources, and tactics of the organization as it attempts to generate attention for its cause on  social media.

Please cite these data using the citation listed above.


ABSTRACT (of article)

Do advocacy organizations stimulate public conversation about social problems by engaging in rational debate, or by appealing to emotions? We argue that rational and emotional styles of communication ebb and flow within public discussions about social problems due to the alternating influence of social contagion and saturation effects. These �cognitive-emotional currents� create an opportunity structure whereby advocacy organizations stimulate more conversation if they produce emotional messages after prolonged rational debate or vice versa. We evaluate this hypothesis using automated text-analysis techniques that measure the frequency of cognitive and emotional language within two advocacy fields on Facebook over 1.5 years and a web-based application that offered these organizations a complimentary audit of their social media outreach in return for sharing non-public data about themselves, their social media audiences, and the broader social context in which they interact. Time-series models reveal strong support for our hypothesis, controlling for 33 confounding factors measured by our Facebook application. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for future research on public deliberation, how social contagions relate to each other, and the emerging field of computational social science.



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AUTHOR�S CONTACT INFORMATION

Christopher A. Bail
Lowey Associate Professor of Sociology and Public Policy
254 Soc./Psych Hall
Duke University
417 Chapel Dr. 
Durham, NC 27708
christopher.bail@duke.edu

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FILE DESCRIPTION

README.txt							This file
Bail Brown Mann 2017 Replication Data			Main dataset 


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DESCRIPTION OF VARIABLES

[1] "no_unique_comments_more_than_three_words"     

The number of unique social media users who made comments about an advocacy organization�s posts that were more than three words long. Note: values of this indicator are binned to protect anonymity of organizations and results may therefore differ from main models presented in our article. Values are binned into increments of 5 (except values of 0 and 1), in order to prevent public identification organizations. 

 [2] "org_contributes_phase_shift"                         

      This is a binary indicator that describes whether the tone of the organization�s posts contributes to a phase shift on that day. 

 [3] "no_posts_previous_day"                               

	The total number of posts produced by the organization during the previous day

 [4] " org_budget"           

	Organization�s total yearly budget, reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey. Note: values of this indicator are binned to protect anonymity of organizations and results may therefore differ from main models presented in our article

1	>0			<1,000,000
2	>1,000,000		<5,000,000
3	>5,000,000		<10,000,000
4	>10,000,000                

 [5] "org_no_page_fans_day_of_post"                        

	The organization�s Total number of Facebook fans (varies by day)

 [6] " org_age_in_years"                          

	Organization�s age in years, reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

1	>0			<5
2	>5		           <10
3	>10			<15
4	>15                

                   
 [7] "org_no_full_time_staff"                

	Total number of full-time staff employed by organization, reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.
              
 [8] "org_no_volunteers_or_members"       

	Total number of volunteers or members of organization, reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

 [9] "org_betweennes_centrality_daily_network"             

	Betweenness centrality of organization in two mode network that links organizations and Facebook commenters across entire advocacy field by day.

[10] "org_closeness_centrality_daily_network"        

	Closeness centrality of organization in two mode network that links organizations and Facebook commenters across entire advocacy field by day.
      
[11] "no_audio_visuals_org_posts_previous_day"         

	Number of posts produced by organization that contain photos, videos, or music, during the previous day.
    
[12] "no_influential_topics_org_posts_previous_day"        

	Number of posts produced by organization that discuss an influential topic, as identified by topic models.

[13] "total_org_page_views_from_facebook_advertising"      

	Total number of people who viewed an organization�s posts each day because the organization paid to advertise within the person�s Facebook news feed

[14] "org_uses_other_social_media_sites"                   

	Dichotomous indicator that describes whether organizations use other social media sites (e.g. Facebook). Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

[15] "org_uses_offline_advertizing"                  

	Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization pays for television or radio advertising. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

      
[16] "org_hires_social_media_consultant"     

Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization hires a social media consultant. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

              
[17] "org_distributes_print_publications"     

Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization distributes print publications (e.g pamphlets). 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

             
[18] "org_coordinates_leisure_activites_to_raise_awareness"

Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization coordinates leisure activities such as charity walks or meals. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.


[19] "org_coordinates_letter_writing_campaigns"       

Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization coordinates letter-writing campaigns to raise support about their cause. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.
     
[20] "org_recruits_celebrity_spokesperson"        

Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization recruits celebrity spokespeople to advertise their cause. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.
         
[21] "org_participates_in_political_lobbying"              

Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization engages in political lobbying. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

[22] "org_coordinates_rallies_protests_or_boycotts"       


Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization engage in rallies, protests, or boycotts. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

 
[23] "org_performs_door_to_door_outreach"     

Five point scale that describes offline tactics of organization: whether organization goes door to door to raise awareness. 1=never, 5=very often. Reported by organizational representative to study�s social media application survey.

             
[24] "total_org_page_views_day_of_post"       

Total number of people who viewed organization�s posts each day
             
[25] "opinion_leadership_index"    
Measure of status of those who comment upon organization�s posts during previous day (defined by number of likes those people�s comments receive from other Facebook users besides the organization itself)
                        
[26] "audience_homophily_index"      

Index that describes the similarity of those who view the organizations posts during the previous day according to age, gender, and geographic region of the United States.
                      
[27] "no_page_views_east_us"              

The total number of people who viewed the organization�s posts from the Eastern U.S. during the previous day.
                 
[28] "no_page_views_midwest_us"       

The total number of people who viewed the organization�s posts from the Midwestern U.S. during the previous day.
                     
[29] "no_page_views_south_us"          

The total number of people who viewed the organization�s posts from the Southern U.S. during the previous day.
                    
[30] "no_page_views_west"  

The total number of people who viewed the organization�s posts from the Western  U.S. during the previous day.
                                
[31] "no_page_viewers_under_35_by_day"            

The total number of people who viewed the organization�s posts who are under age 35 during the previous day.
         
[32] "percent_female_page_viewers_by_day"         

The percentage of people who viewed the organization�s posts who were female during previous day.
         
[33] "number_of_org_blog_mentions_previous_day"   

The total number of mentions the organization received during the previous day on Google Blogs.
         
[34] "number_of_org_news_articles_previous_day"            

The total number of mentions the organization received during the previous day on Google News

[35] "number_google_searches_about_issue_previous_day"     

Relative volume of Google searches for term �autism� or �organ donation� during the previous day (depending upon sample, see below)

[36] "sample"  

Categorical indicator that describes whether the organization is an Autism organization or an Organ Donation Organization.
